Lahat ng Kabanata ng Beneath The Mask Of Vengeance: Kabanata 1 - Kabanata 5

I watch them laugh.The ballroom glitters beneath crystal chandeliers, wolves hidden behind elegant masks. Some dance. Some drink. Some flirt.Most of them stare in my direction, hiding their words behind their palms with short giggles.Even so, all of them look like they belong here.I don't.A girl in an owl mask catches my eye across the room. The moment our gazes meet, she whispers something to the boy beside her.My lips twitch, curving upward in a desperate attempt at a smile. They both look away.They always do.Still, I try. To smile. To wave. To heck, even start a conversation but they never see me the way they see each other.I am smaller. Weaker.Weirder.The awkward heir they only glimpse once in a blue moon. The fragile girl who never attends the same schools, the same gatherings.I should have just stayed home.My thumb finds the edge of my fingernail before I even notice I'm doing it. A small, sharp sting.I look down. A bead of blood.Of course. My bad habit.I press my

"No!" Air rips from my lungs, body trembling as my eyes fly wide open.My head won't stop throbbing. The ringing in my ears only makes my hazy vision worse.“Finally.”I gasp, turning toward the direction of the groaning voice, but all I can see are silhouettes of two people—one sitting, the other standing.“Two weeks…” the voice rasps. “...later.”I wince, moaning in pain."What's going on?"Silence.My head throbs harder as the hazy vision slowly settles into a perfect image of people I've never seen in my life.Two pairs of brown eyes observe me with stoic expressions, radiating auras I've never witnessed.Wolves? Yes.But more.Then…I gasp, throwing my head away from their gaze like a girl gone mad as the realization settles on me.My eyes!My eyes!!Oh goddess, my fucking blue eyes!!!"Is she stable?"A mirror.I need a mirror.I scramble across the room, head bent to the ground in search of the one thing that will determine the fate of my life.Whether I get to live or die.If

I surface, coughing with the piercing eyes surrounding me, cameras pointed. Laughter. Their gazes. Their mockery. Like I had to endure in Winterhowl, but worse.And Ballard, his eyes slice away from mine. Remorseless.He walks away without looking back. I'm in the cold fountain, humiliated on the first day of a new elite school, but I can't bring myself to blame him. It's my fault for believing there's ever a good in people like these.Heaving in the cold air, I drag my soaked body towards the edge of the fountain, struggling to climb through the slippery algae habitat of a wall.The fabric is clinging to my skin, exposing my insecurities of a body. And suddenly, I'm no longer a pretend wolf in the Wolfspire Empire but the timid heir in Winterhowl, being mocked and laughed at.I can see their piercing gazes, assessing. Closing in on me like a fox to a rabbit."Is he?" Mute hushes ring from around me. I lift my head to see the boy from earlier, but this time he's not only staring at me